Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
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What's wrong with AoC? How can it improve?
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This is a simple little forum I have been really wanting to put together simply because progress shouldn't go unchecked. I love AoC much as the next on this site but sometimes we should address the problems it has. This isn't for things we know are going to improve like combat, or balancing but instead for the things we have seen that may diverge into other areas of or disliking.
A quick example would be how in ESO for a long time it was a problem with the amount of effects being rendered on screen in large PVP and PVE trials encounters. In AoC so far we have seen a wide variety of effects being displayed. The tank raising walls, and the rangers current iteration of the arrow storm ability, even the basic attacks had a visual effect for every time the enemy was struck with the staff. These are some I could see being toned backwards.
In the most recent developer play though of the game we saw them attempt a boss fight in the Dünir dungeon. I couldn't tell if the boss had any mechanics or not due to the amount of effects being thrown out.
With the hopes high for massive scale battles I am afraid of the amount of on screen rendering for all the class effects. Beautiful but dangerously hindering.
That's my first throw out on what they might be able to improve upon before it get's worse. Again this is constructive criticism for the game on things we might be able to catch early. No hard feelings, just want to see it be the best it can be.
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For example when you played skyrim the world was beautiful but not because it was magical, but because it was something eye catching and natural. Giant rolling mountains on the horizon, dense forests, snow capped tundras. Then you find black reach. The underground cavern beneath the world filled with magic mushrooms and crystals. This was amazing because it was able to do something different and amazing in a world we already considered beautiful.
My point being that in world building don't make the crystals, glowing mushrooms, bright lights and luminscent plants the normal. Make them the exception. Look for what is already beautiful in the real world today. Make dunes that roll into the horizon, jungles dense with vines and leaves, snowy mountains touching the sky, hidden canyons, marshes, and all the rest.
I think the Lord of the Rings movies did this really well and I think you can do it too. I only make mention of it because we have seen a lot of bio luminescence in the videos and was curious if this was truly the exception or the example?
PS: The mountains in the background look like piles of playdough but this is irrelevant cause thats likely going to get fixed. Love you guys
To me too much eye candy spoils the environment.
You cant compare ESO to AOC they are both different. One is plain and dull and the other is bright and colorful. Yes I agree having too much emissive lighting can detract from the overall environment.
the dungeon from the livestream, poor design. Walk in, leash and kill, simplistic, boring and offers nothing out of the ordinary. With new games it’s inportant to know what you see is what you get until you see something new otherwise.
the mobs in the dungeon and approach the developers took in creating the dungeon was poorly designed. The developers went for a, one tough mob that it takes a decent amount of time to kill, have everyone attack it, and have I deal tons of damage.
When it’s usually much more fun to take in a larger number of creatures, with lesser health, so AoE is relevant, and kill them quicker. And have them all do small damage but often so players are losing health and have time to change up their gameplay, play aggressive, play defensive. Cast abilities, allow the healer to heal the party.
also, the group was playing without a healer, and the dungeon, damage, regeneration of health was all created to diminish the role of healers. I thought one of the goals of the game was using tanks, healers and dps. None of that was present.
ill let some of that go by because of the constant claims combat will get better, but if you could make one, perfect dungeon, implementing perfect combat mechanics, just have one amazing piece of work, as a sample test to base the rest of the game off then that’d be great. So far not impressed.
I day all this because it’s tough love and good criticism. It’s how to make a more fun game. Either this is another game super hyped because of nice graphics and high promises, with an interesting innovative idea or two (which I already thought of, advancing regional nodes with world triggers), or some serious work gets done to make this game something promising.
dont let the “most hyped” mmo in development fool you because it changes every quarter or two.
https://www.destructoid.com/rust-is-nearing-the-end-of-its-run-on-steam-early-access-437537.phtml
which is why I mentioned, not use the one mob, big health high damage output and use the several mob with lesser health and lessser, but constant damage. That’s something they could have easily done “instead” of what they did, which would have a better impact for dungeon design. That should be the take away for constructive criticism for the next dungeon they decide to derp around in and play in.
I always play decils asvacate because my cause my goal is to make other games better, not bitter it up and make the developers feel comfortable, I tell developers what’s wrong with their games, so they can make a better product.
While it is certainly fair to criticize these rather serious shortcomings, I don't think it's fair to suggest this is indicative of how the final game will play...yet.
When is it fair to suggest the game is terminally flawed at a fundamental level? I imagine around Alpha 2 the core systems will be largely in place. By then, the class interdependence will likely be nearly finalized because there won't be time for a complete combat overhaul for all classes.
Until then, all we can do is keep voicing complaints, despite the fanboi wannabe forum god's blind defense of the game.
PS - No, simply removing the clicky combo bar does not really count as any real significant change to combat...all they did was hide the visual and extended the click window to be so large the player always triggered the combo...about the laziest "fix" imaginable.
What's wrong with AoC? How can it improve?
Nothing. Nothing is wrong with it.It is a game, in early development, which is progressing nicely.
Whatever your opinion might be feel welcome to share it. Even if it seems they are obviously going to improve upon it we can still make note of it and look forward to seeing the best outcome for the development.
At some point though, they will have to actually show some changes. They haven't shown any changes at all so far other than visually turning off the combo bar, which is...not really a change.
The fanbois will spout the tried and true line of, "what we are seeing are all placeholders so until they then nothing to worry about", for the entire development of the game. They will even spout the same line after release.
For the rest of us, we will need to see some actual changes.
Id like to see attacks that have weight and effects their enemies. Will striking an enemy with lightening repeatedly have a chance to electrocute them? Will obvious spells like water apply a debuff to enemies that will cause incoming lightning damage to increase? Will tossing a boulder knock someone on their arse?
The wiki said
“Combat will be a hybrid system that focuses on skill, composition, balance/counterbalance, and movement/positioning”
Is there anything more than just telegraphed attacks you move or, maybe add a dodge mechanic to the game with an iframe and dodge energy bar? Is positioning as simple as tank in front, healer in the back?
**What you see isn’t what you get in development world. And it wasn’t just their last video, it was all of them.
I saw the same problem in several of their videos, sure it wasn’t “super bad” because, I mean it works but the health bar takes priority over the monsters when being displayed to the character
you wouldn’t see small spiders, you’d see a lot of health bars. Also it ruins immersion, makes me think I’m just attacking health bars instead of whatever creature I’m attacking. It clutters the screen, it’s be smarter to have only selected or targets you’re looking at display health so you can see better. This isn’t the kind of thing you should be sure they’d change as the game goes on unless someone said something about it, hence why I’m saying it here.
theres other reasons to not display health but I’ll leave that to your imagination. The only benefit you’d gain from seeing all their health is... seeing thei health... and playing “delete the health bar” not, “delete that pig” or what have you.
If it were just me I’d say have no health bars
“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown”
Fear mah powah!!
We see the Tank class have the ability to pull mobs to him with his Scorpion attack from Mortal Kombat. We also know the Tank will have a skill to rush to a target (it was actually on Steven's hotbar...he just never used it). We also see Tanks repeatedly use that wall ability to trip/stun enemies.
We also see casters attempt to use some sort of freeze spell that seems to be a way to root an opponent. The mobs always seem to resist the effect (with a "Resisted" pop up over their heads), but the skill is definitely going to be in place.
I'm hoping the Tank (and the group) will have to work on physically tanking enemies, not just building up some hate counter.
1. about the pvp and pve .How good the combat is , is based on what feeling you get when fighting :the feeling of power, that your presence there makes a difference and also the adrenaline when you are near death and don't wanna lose your stuff .I dont think you have to implement a mini game mechanic "to make it feel unique " your are not trying to reinvent the whole thing here but insted trying to fix and add more depth to it .
2. I dont think i heard anything about it , but will there be terra forming and how much the players will be able to shape the cites? . What i mean is that I dont know if the players choose where to build the houses , taverns , shops , etc or if everything is set from the beginning for a certain level of a city . And about the terra forming it would be interesting to see mines made by players with npc's working there , underground fortresses , or even more . ( i may be thinking way to far but taking into consideration the fact that the game should give more freedom to the player such things should implement into the game with the passage of time )
3. Will there be any weather changing magic and what about the weather itself will it give buffs or debuffs like fog making you miss more skill based shots ?Will there be different tiers of weather like normal rain , heavy rain with stronger or weaker effects on the environment .
4. I would also like to see a difference of danger levels between the night and day . Like let's say that there is a forest with mobs around level 30 ; in the time of day everything is according to the description but in the time of night random monsters ( like mini bosses )spawn and they start searching for the players . Based on the level and number of the players the bosses will get their own . Like 10 players of level 40 enter the forest in the time of night the bosses won't spawn instantly but after the players spent some time collecting resources , killing mobs ( the time period should be randomized so they cant expect when the boss(es) will come) finally they get ganked by 3 level 45 Night Stalkers . They can choose to run with the stuff they collected or try to defeat the bosses and get some rare resources or something special .
There are plenty of things a player can imagine ; most of us played multiple games for God knows how long and got our own opinions on what feels good and bad . If the game developer really decided to listen to the voices of the players i will gladly tell my opinion and help as much as possible so this game can turn from hope and dreams to reality . Sry if my English is bad i am still learning and please tell me if u disagree , i am open to other opinions
1. The combat is a work in progress. Watching streams is what most people have been reduced to at this point and many are judging something without having that "mouth feel" Think of it like watching someone make a cheeseburger on a cooking show and describing to you how it tastes, you may think it looks like crap, or looks delicious, but until you try the same thing in your own kitchen you really don't know if adding that basil to the mix really changed things for the better.
2. You will not be able to terraform. Cities are set as to where in a node they form. You will however be able to place your freehold anywhere that fits in their placement guidelines in the zoi of a node that has achieved a minimum of level 3. The cities architecture is determined by the race that contributed the most to that phase of the node development. Each of later levels in cities will have various upgrade options/paths that will allow mayors to have some limited control of what is built in their individual city. How they are laid out however is not something they have said will be available.
3. No information on player cast weather changing magic. We do have possibility of npc encounters changing weather, like a winter spirit locks a node in perpetual winter till dealt with. Weather will have an effect on certain skills as will the season. Rivers and lakes will freeze over and such.
4. This is also being addressed with different spawn tables based on time of day/night.
Hope this helps.
- Hitboxes ( how would in-game physics affect this ? On players & magic too ?
- Magic. ( think of Fantasia & Fantasia 2000 )
- Action Combat
- Tab-target
- Magical Bazzar
- Magical Library
- Magical Study ( Studies ? )
- Free-formless Combat
- Treetop Canopy Elevation / Higher Elevation for Players to explore / interconnected pathways
Am Referencing all Posts i made in the provided Link (below) for the idea above [ https://forums.ashesofcreation.com/discussion/33184/zones-like-these-design/p1 ]- Fundamentals Mechanics of Magic-Combat
Similar to " magic-vs-magic " scenarios ... will their be Beam-Struggles similar to DBZ ? Or Battles similar to " Dumbledore vs Voldermort " ? Both ? Any others ? like Final Fantasy Series ?How would Elements interact with one another in-combat ? (below an example)
(think of Beam Struggles for the below examples if it helps)
Scenario 1) " Fire-vs-Water " ... Will Fire Cool-off (lose) ? or Water evaporate (lose) ?
Scenario 2) " Water-vs-Ice " ... Will the Ice melt away ? or the Ice Freeze the Water ?
Scenario 3) " Wind-vs-Fire " ... Can Wind " suffocate " Fire ? Or Fire burns through ?
etc ...
- Intertwining the Two Concepts of Magic-Combat vs Non-Magic Combat
If Player A uses a Wind-Sword and attack/swing , and Player B uses a Earth-Sword and blocks ... what would happen ? if reversed, what would happen ? What about other Elements ? What about Enchanted-Armor or other Equipment ?Just stuff i thought about
- Summoner
- Rogue ( i think ? )
- Bard
- Fighter
I am most interested in the Bard. Eager to see the Manipulative-Magic and hoping to see how it differs from the Mage. Likewise, hoping to see the Fighter and how it differs from the Tank-Archetype ( as opposed to just seeing the KickStarter Gif )EDIT: Technically the Rogue have been showcased before on an Older LiveStream. Not sure how much of a difference it is now
One thing I hope doesn't happen is player achievements and rewards becoming a result of luck over time from repetitive attempts rather than skill applied to complete the task a single time. % drop rates and crafting/enchantment success chances create huge disparities between players in the effort/skill/time/resources required for the same reward. It also doesn't respect player time, which I hate to no end.
It'd be nice to translate rarity into something that makes sense in the world rather than a hidden % drop/success chance players have no control over. E.g. a rare flower needed in a recipe grows in winter in a certain geographical region when there's lightning. The conditions are complex but the power is in the player's hands to then get the item.